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Artist’s notes are a rich source for understanding the motivations behind an artwork, but have been largely neglected by both art history researchers and in scholarly editing. Using the digital edition of the notebooks of the Austrian artist Hartmut Skerbisch as a case study, this article discusses the various methodological approaches to versions in different disciplines—(digital) scholarly editing, musicology, and art history—and their transferability to artists’ notes. It explores where versions can be found in a single autograph, in contrast to multiple witnesses, and how they can be represented digitally. Special attention is given to the versioning of graphics—prominently used as form of expression in the relevant notebooks—proposing a model for their formal description which makes them more comparable and reveals different versions and, consequently, the artistic development process.

This volume approaches an understanding of the term versioning in the broadest sense, discussing ideas about how versions differ across forms of media, including text, image, and sound. Versions of cultural objects are identified, defined, articulated, and analysed through diverse mechanisms in different fields of research. The study of versions allows for the investigation of the creative processes behind the conception of works, a closer inspection of their socio-political contexts, and promotes investigation of their provenance and circulation. Chapters in this volume include discussion of what a “version” means in different fields, case studies implementing digital versioning techniques, conceptual models for representing versions digitally, and computational and management issues for digital projects.